Another Strike Could Result In UK Oil, Gas Shutdowns
The United Kingdom’s oil and gas industry is bracing for another strike, after the British labor union Union announced that more than a thousand offshore workers would begin a 2-day strike starting on Monday.
The 1,300 offshore workers that are set to walk off the job for 48 hours starting on Monday could disrupt oil and gas production for BP, CNRI, EnQuest, Harbour, Ithaca, Shell, TAQA, and TotalEnergies.
The UK’s Unite Union called the strike, set to go into effect on Monday, earlier last month over pay issues.
The prospective action includes electrical, production, and mechanical technicians in addition to deck crew, scaffolders crane operators, pipefitters, platers, and riggers working for Bilfinger UK Limited, Stork construction, Petrofac Facilities Management, the Wood Group UK Limited, and Sparrows Offshore Services, according to the union. Offshore workers at those five companies have overwhelmingly voted in recent days to begin strike action as they demand a better deal on jobs, pay, and conditions.
“1400 offshore workers are now set to take strike action against these employers who are raking it but refusing to give them a fair share of the pie. This will create a tsunami of industrial unrest in the offshore sector,” Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said in March, arguing that oil and gas companies have profited handsomely over the last year and referring to drilling concessions as “effectively licences to print money.”
Monday’s strike will be the second in a series of planned strikes that began March 29 and will run until June 7, the Unite union announced at the onset of the first strike in the series.
France has recently been subjected to some striking action as well, as unions there mobilized French refinery workers last month. Those strikes blocked refined product shipments from the Donges and La Mede refineries and reduced output at the Normandy and Feyzin refineries.
By Julianne Geiger for Oilprice.com
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